For everything below and above, only you know how you should love.

Latest Post: 12/30/2014

Bad Trip as Good Thing

Bad Trip as Good Thing

A bad trip is not an airplane in a tail spin where you as a pilot need to scramble to get out of it... though life might feel like that sometimes... no, it's a moment for you to be thankful for all that is coming up for you at that moment.

When clarity comes there is is truth. When you feel afraid, you might then feel ashamed for being afraid that people will realize you aren't that strong. In that vulnerability though is strength, and ultimately a more fulfilling strength. And with that you can stop yourself from running, by embracing that which you are afraid of, and if you still are struggling? Try this little meditation... seriously, try the flippin' meditation. Try it with your cat!

Sitting Beside the River (About: My simple but effective meditation, Author: Me, 1993)

Close your eyes (maaaybe *after* reading this) Now, imagine you are sitting by the side of a river flowing to your left. It's a sunny, calm afternoon, the other side is a small forest. Now, with your eyes closed, breathe in and out slowly, visualizing yourself sitting beside the water's flow... and every time a thought carries you away, simply let it go. Return to your breath, return to the side of the water.

When you live in fear, things get hurt, because it takes time for your physical action to be translated by your brain, and then for fear of hurting someone you stop...but when you embrace your fear and live with your fear, as a mirror, no harm is possible, for you walk with peace, your body flows with life as it dances with you, and thus no fear micro blindness and unfortunate action...

This is starting to get a bit technical, so I will leave it there.

December 30, 2014

[7:20a]

It's not about what you have, it's about how you feel.

[7:32a]

Contrary to physical assumption, listening has less to do with the ears than with the mind.

New Poem: The Magician

December 29, 2014

[1:48a]

I have 3 female bettas and 2 tanks... I just cleaned and conditioned one of the tanks and had to decide which fish to put in that tank... so I observed the tank with all 3 in it... one little girl was sleeping in a corner... another was wandering... the largest saw the wanderer, and started lazily following it... getting close.. and then started to chase it a little... so... the aggressive one, that's the one I moved to the other tank.

[9:30a]

Isn't it cute the way government thinks telling people to stop, will have any affect on people's relationship to marijuana? If anything, saying no is what entices kids to want to try it, I know it worked with me. Kids need to rebel to assert their individual identity. If you want to stop kids from smoking marijuana, easy, make the parents think it's cool and make it legal, and watch, give it a few generations and kids won't even care about it.

We can stop the war on each other, just think of everyone as one family, now allow all living things in that circle... now allow the infinite cosmos in....

December 28, 2014

[5:04a]

When we are not taught self-confidence as a child, we may grow up to believe mistakes are omens and not lessons.

New Poem: The Prisoner

[11:41p]

I'm changing it from 'Sex, Drugs, and Rock 'N Roll' to 'Hugs, Buds, and Movie Soundtracks' How's that sound?

December 27, 2014

[11:14p]

When you get everything for free, your appreciation and attention level drops significantly. Because we live in a society where money means something, if you spend a little bit on the things you want... you will find your wants lessening, and encompassing the things you truly want most, and you will give your appreciation and attention to them, and they in turn will gift you with insights by the very nature of the human mind's intellect being present... and so... simplify, harmonize, and be well.

December 25, 2014

[11:18p]

I don't know when it started, but it started with tears. Tears I could not understand. I didn't know where they were coming from, but they welled up from some hidden underworld within myself, or perhaps from a black hole within the cosmos of my being... perhaps they were God crying for me, blossoming a flower through me... to show me something, perhaps it was faulty programming. But whatever it was, how it cleaned the mirror of my being... soon after I realized every time I looked into somebody's eyes, I didn't see them, not as a them anyway, but as a unified part of me, and this shared beingness that we were all a part of, this bridge, this God. And from that point forward, the voice that spoke within had a resonance and a purpose, and it never stumbled, and when it spoke true, it pulled light out of that black hole, and it poured forth in those mysterious tears... and I knew perhaps for the very first time in my life, what it is I had to do.

December 24, 2014

[4:43a]

The next time I see a butterfly, I will not merely stop and think, 'that's beautiful', and walk on. I will stop and remember that this tiny creature that I experience as living art, an archetypal, mythical, spiritual representation of hope and change in my life, giving me strength and inspiration, dies of old age in less than a week. Next time I will say 'thank you', because in its short life it has taught me all that, and I may live 100 years without ever coming close to returning the favor.

[11:00a]

But why is it so often that it is the people of a tolerant religion who are so often the least tolerant people? People I've known for years, quick to cut off friendships due to text based misunderstandings and perceived transgressions? It should not be done.

I ask for them, "Jesus, what would you do?" Listening with my conscience for the ringtone of any proper Diety, the shower water taps down to a steady and slowing silence... and then?

The Earth spins slowly on, a few last drops echo in the distance and only the endless hum of organic machinery remains...

[4:30p]

People have learned that in order to get along with nearly anyone, all they must do is simply stand for nothing, and this character neutrality sells them as a good friend, but I disagree with this fundamentally... because it challenges nothing, it offers nothing thought provoking or compelling... it merely allows mankind to flow downstream without obstacle from womb to tomb... and that's not good enough for me.

December 23, 2014

[4:20a]

When people think the only way to become the best version of themselves requires money at all costs, your first five bucks should be spent on a compass and a map.

[11:25a]

Some people just complain because they haven't learned how to turn obstacles into opportunities, and they need someone to show them the way. Instead of complaining about their complaining... show them the way.

December 22, 2014

[4:00a]

I noticed I have gotten to a point in my life where the negativity of others focused at me just has no affect anymore, and bullies start taking on the look of a fish in a tank that's struggling to assert its own identity in the current... sort of cute, all bark and no bite, I think as a people we're really evolving past the reactionary mind and victim mentalities, giving our power away... perhaps I can be the 100th monkey of personal empowerment.

December 18, 2014

[5:40p]

Do you think it's possible to get so stoned that you can feel the marionette strings attached to your shoulders and the top of your head? And if you follow them up you will see God?

December 17, 2014

[11:01p]

Can Religion and Reason coexist? I believe when something doesn't fit into our definitions of science or religion, it does not make one of these paths wrong necessarily... perhaps it simply makes our definitions incorrect. The true reality defies our science as it defies our dogmas... religion explores how we feel about the universe and fits it into a digestable framework, like training wheels towards reality... an unquantifiable, and overwhelming reality it is... science, in its own way is only as mature as its tool users, and neither road is revealed to us in its fulness... and so I must recognize another force at work that laughs in the face of our figuring, our conflict, and wrap around mental attitudes, in all our clinging and desperation... a true fullness that wraps around us beyond all our ability to wrap around it... like a burrito trying to wrap around itself...

When you try to think of the universe as something outside yourself it cannot be done, because beyond all thing-thinking there is a deeper thing that embraces all simultaneously in the multitudes a beautiful spirit that we all are a part of... call it God, call it anything you like... but when it calls you, there is no denying it ultimately in the end, no denying at all.

~Jonathan Berman 12/17/2014 11:01PM

For I have been a drop of water, and I have been the sea.
And when I looked for answers what I saw was me.
And when I let go of searching, in remorse for all my thoughts.
I never knew the beauty around me was more than I had sought.

December 13, 2014

[1:23p]

As long as the stars keep shining, I will never look back.

[4:29p]

Are all the planets aligned, or is it all in your mind?

- 12/13/14

December 12, 2014

[4:10a]

Star Trek The Next Generation once stated matter-of-factly that "Space" is the final frontier", but it is my belief, that while the original Star Trek's "to boldly go where no man has gone before" was updated to 'no one has gone before', 'final frontier' will too be updated, for space is merely one frontier, and there are many others... Technology has always ran ahead of Humanity, and it is this technology that takes us into space, but it will be Humanity which takes us into a far more compelling space... the space within. A Space of even more profound frontiers.

December 11, 2014

[9:30p]

I feel in a very invasion of the body snatchers way, I am safe because I've never seen a Macaulay Culkin film.

December 8, 2014

[5:48p]

We all know the phrase, "We're having too much fun", and it's only used in connection with doing something you know secretly is so stupid and unproductive, that you really shouldn't be enjoying yourself as much as you are, the task at hand does not deserve or warrant such excessive celebration or hilarity, and yet there it is... to which I say... we should all be striving for this with everything we do, cultivating the "too much fun" mindset in all our daily activities.. lets see if we can have too much fun, all the time. I have a feeling, it will be okay.

[7:44p]

Advertising works because no one believes it does. It's like a time release memory enhancer... at the time you hate the commercials, they are always at least 25% louder than whatever you're watching, and if you don't mute them, or download past them, they are getting in, and you think they're not... but in ten years when you buy that Acura, and think it was your choice, it wasn't. You planted that commercial seed ten years ago, and it just blossomed. That's how they get ya.

[7:58p]

So I say to her, "Look, I don't think we have enough room in our life for your boyfriend."

December 5, 2014 test

[5:13a]

When I think of myself within the universe and the extreme forces at work, the tensions, the ones that exist beyond my comprehension, I think of consciousness as a baby suckling on the breast of a cosmic mother; that breath, and think, perhaps what we call the expanding universe is merely the slow exhale of God. Perhaps while God is toiling away on his projects, we are merely the bacteria that live within his body, blown around him on dream-like currents. Perhaps as we know not where our inspirations come from that wander in us, we are the animacules of inspiration that wander through God.

December 4, 2014

[5:50a]

Everything falls apart, even you... the trick is not to fall apart mentally when this happens, recognizing a choice granted in the form of two lessons... impermanence for that which cannot be fixed, and creativity for that which can.

[2:57p]

As a poet, philosopher, songwriter, I get many of my best ideas in the shower... and it's really not surprising... the shower is a place where we become fully receptive and let go simultaneously, like a meditation... in such a uniquely one-pointed environment, that inspiration can arise quite unimpeded.

December 3, 2014

[7:05a]

Peanut butter's cryin' cos the jelly got tired.

[3:36p]

I don't need a castle fit for a King, just a playground fit for a swing.

[4:31p]

The only truth, is love.
It is these terrible histories that make us cry so deeply, that allow the shining light to penetrate.

[7:04p]

In'tra'jeday

Naptime for me and my universe. If you realize you lost some time once I return, sorry to be the one to inform you that you only exist in my dreams, but if you remember the next few hours in any way, well, I likely dreamed you to remember it that way anyway so you still don't exist , and if I'm a remnant of your dreams, please be kind and fall asleep thinking of me fondly, and I'll do the same for you. I love all of you. Yes, even you.

December 1, 2014

[12:45a]

Here's how the media works... if you give the masses 10% of a story but give that story a face that the people can turn 100% toward or against, they will consider it 100% of the story... and it works, it works every time. Even with social media and infinite information, it works... and it works because the masses are not just dealing with one story, but so many stories that they simply cannot juggle them all, they are overloaded with so much information that the public ability to understand them clearly has been compromised, like an immune system and everywhere we turn is the advertisement for junkfood... and this is happening at every level.